Banana & date clusters

I was feeling like something sweet and tasty but I was conscious that since I’m supposed to be eating well Mon – Fri (strong emphasis on ‘supposed to’ right there), baking was out of question. I tried to come up with something healthy-ish that would hit the spot and that’s how these messy clusters were born. They may need some fine tuning but considering this was the first go, I am happy that you can make them and not fall ill. Hopefully you’ll enjoy them a little bit when you’re at it too…

Makes circa 20 bites (it really depends on size! they could have been smaller and you would end up with a lot more)

200g pitted dates
4 ripe bananas
5 tsp vanilla extract
4 tbsp coconut oil (roughly), melted
2 tbsp honey (you can use more oil or substitute with water if you don’t want it very sweet, it just needs some liquid and I wanted it VERY sweet that day)
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
1/5 tsp salt
2 mugs of oats (mugs may be unconventional but that’s what use!)
50g dark chocolate (really whatever you want to make it tasty, I used about a quarter of a bar), chopped

Preheat oven to 180 degrees. If you’re organised, soak the dates overnight. If you’re not (I’m not) soak them in boiling water for a few minutes. Drain the dates and add to bananas, coconut oil, honey and vanilla in a food processor.

Process until smooth, it should only take about a minute. Stir in the baking powder, cinnamon and salt, process for a few seconds, add 1 cup of oats and process for a few seconds again. Remove the bowl from the base and stir in the rest of the oats + chopped chocolate.

Scoop out the mixture onto lined baking paper in bite sized portions and baked for around 20min (depending on the oven & size of your clusters), turning the sheet once to ensure they bake evenly.